Monday, May 13, 2013

My First Real Shavuot

For the
first seventeen years of my life Shavuot had little meaning to me as a Jewish
holiday. Rather, it was a time for religious school graduations, always held on
the Sunday closest to the holiday. Those graduations were called confirmations.
The idea for them was probably taken from the Catholic religion which has their
teenagers affirm their faith in a religious ceremony also called confirmation.

Since I came
from a big, extended family I remember going to many confirmation ceremonies
throughout my childhood. My own confirmation took place when I was fifteen-years-old.
Relatives came for the day from Oklahoma and Missouri. I had a new white dress,
carried a bouquet of flowers, and confirmed my commitment to Judaism.

I suppose it
was that commitment which prompted me to be among the group of students who accepted
the Shavuot invitation. The invitation was extended by one of the day school
teachers in the Phoenix Day School to me and other students from Arizona State
University. This teacher was a most charismatic man and his wife was an
outstanding cook. In addition, he stressed that we would be staying up all
night Shavuot learning Torah. This, he told us, was the most important custom
of the holiday.

Pulling
all-nighters has never been a big deal for college students but he made it
sound so intriguing. He got a nice group of us to come. Benita, the oldest of
our group, was not all that interested in celebrating the Jewish holiday. Rather,
since she would be graduating the following month, she wanted as many
interesting experiences as she could find before she left Arizona.

So after a
delicious holiday meal, we followed the teacher to the synagogue where he had a
handful of adults and numbers of excited school-age children. I really don’t
remember all that much learning. I do remember there were some fun
conversations and interesting discussions. Around five in the morning, a little
before sunrise, it was time to go home. Well, not home, but to the teacher’s
house. We all had brought sleeping bags and were going to camp out on his
living room carpet for a few hours until he would wake us to go back to the
synagogue for morning services.

The sky was
not yet light as we followed him home. He sort of resembled a piped piper.
Instead of a cap with a feather he had a velvet yarmulke. In place of a flute
he held books of learning. We must have made an interesting sight, so much so
that a police cruiser did a u-turn, stopped, and an officer of the law emerged.

“What are
you doing out at this time of night?” he asked sternly.

A few of us
giggled as the teacher tried to explain Shavuot to this man who had probably never
met a Jew before.

He was not at
all impressed. “How old are all of you?” The officer frowned at us.

“Eighteen,”
I mumbled.

“Nineteen,”
another offered.

“I’m
twenty-one!” Benita announced boldly looking the officer straight in the eye.

“You are the
only one of age,” the policemen glared at her. “The rest of you are out after
curfew.”

“When does
curfew end?” The teacher asked, somewhat nervously.

“Six am.”

None of us
were giggling any longer. Were we going to get hauled into detention for
breaking curfew? Would we get a ticket? What would our parents say? The officer
grumbled a few more minutes and decided to let us off with a stern warning.
“Don’t let this happen again.”

Chastened,
we walked home quietly and collapsed on the floor. I don’t think any of us got
up in time to go to morning services with the teacher. We rolled out of our
sleeping bags just in time to have another delicious holiday meal. And that was
my first real Shavuot. I have never forgotten it and I have never, ever again
stayed up all night to learn.I leave
that custom to my husband and children, do my learning during the day, and
still manage to still have a meaningful holiday that commerates the giving of
the Torah. How I do that is for another article.

Aim of Blog

Emunah, faith in God, does not mean believing only good things will happen; it means believing that whatever God does is for the best. I wrote these words at a time when drive-by shootings and suicide bombers had become almost weekly, if not daily, tragedies. Now, more than ten years later, the words are no less true. Whatever HaShem does is for the best. It is my hope to post articles, advice, and homey stories everyweekwhich will reinforce this fact. And now, a special thanks to:

Batya Medad, my neighbor and experienced blogger. Without her I would never have been able to set up

About Me

Born in Wichita, Kansas, I became a Baalat Teshuva, newly religious, in Phoenix, Arizona while attending ASU. After twelve years of marriage my husband and I made Aliyah with five children and settled in Shilo in the heart of Israel. Two more children joined the family as have daughters-in-law, sons-in-law, and grandchildren, Baruch HaShem. My favorite past times are learning, sewing, hiking, reading, cooking, baking, enjoying my family and friends, and, of course, writing. My first novel, Sondra’s Search, was published in 2007 and I am working on the sequel.